The movie Frozen became an instant Disney classic, pretty much overnight. Making the film, however, took several years and there were a lot of twists and turns along the snowy road to success. In the television special “The Story of Frozen: Making a Disney Animated Classic,” narrated by Josh Gad, who voices Olaf in the film, Disney revealed some new info about Elsa, Anna, Kristoff and friends.
Here are some of the more surprising revelations and fun facts about the movie Frozen.
* The song “Do You Want to Build a Snowman” almost didn’t make it in the film. Kristen Bell said it wasn’t added back in until the “witching hour” and that at the very last moment it was included. She said she thinks it is one of the best songs in the movie.
* Frozen is based on the Hans Christian Andersen tale The Snow Queen, which Walt Disney first explored animating in 1937.
* Hyrum Osmond, now Head of Animation at Disney Animation Studios and animation head of Olaf, used his young son as inspiration for Olaf (Olaf and toddlers both bounce a lot) and also used his uncle, Donny Osmond, as inspiration.
* Rosemaling is the term for the decorative painting found throughout Norway and it is found throughout the film, from the rugs in the castle to Elsa’s magic.
* Elsa was originally a classic evil queen that wore a coat of live weasels. Ewwwww. It was the song “Let It Go” that led to her character being re-conceived as misunderstood, not evil.
* It took nine months to work out the construction of Elsa’s ice palace.
* The director of Big Hero 6 is the voice of the Viking shop keeper in Frozen.
* Co-director and co-writer Jennifer Lee said she wanted snow to be a character in the film. The animators went to Jackson Hole, Wyoming, to play in the snow. This is the first animated movie set entirely in the snow.
* At first, Anna and Elsa weren’t going to be sisters, and Anna was going to be a peasant asking Elsa to freeze her broken heart.
* The characters of Frozen are going to star in a news short film with a new song in the spring of 2015.
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